What was your first linux?
Grant
Just scanned the first linux box CD set I bought, Infomagic April 1997...
http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/image/infomagic-front.jpg
http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/image/infomagic-back.jpg
Wanted to try Slackware back then as it had later kernel, but the install
required a heap of floppies, so I started with RedHat instead. Stayed with
RedHat through version 6.2 which I kept for a while, ignoring 7, 8, and
disappointed with RH9 I surveyed available distros and switched to Slackware
at version 9.0 in 2004. Still with Slackware-11.0 on older hardware and
Slackware-12.1 on a newer box.
When did you start using linux?
How did you get hold of your first distro?
Were you a refugee from another distro?
Cheers,
Grant.
Helmut Hullen
Du meintest am 04.07.08:
> When did you start using linux?
Fall 1995, with XLinux (UMSdos, looked like slackware/zipslack)
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
CD from a computer magazine
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
I had tried many other distributions (most of them diskette versions):
no one did run.
System: Laptop Olivetti Philos 33 (?); 386SX, 16 MHz (?), 4 MB RAM.
Viele Gruesse
Helmut
"Ubuntu" - an African word, meaning "Slackware is too hard for me".
Joost Kremers
> When did you start using linux?
1999.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
i bought a book about redhat (don't remember which version) that came with
a cd. i stayed with redhat for about a day, then i went and bought the suse
boxed set. 6.1 i think.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
well, if you're talking about the first distro, that seems quite unlikely,
right? ;-)
but as for slackware, i got my first slack cd in sept. 2001. suse was fine,
but i wanted to dig a little deeper into the system. i wasn't fleeing suse,
just wanted something new.
i once had a brief stint with debian, which ended when i tried to install
mutt on an X-less box. mutt (you know, a CONSOLE MUA) apparently depended
indirectly on X... nowadays i wouldn't notice such a thing anymore, because
my days on the linux console have long gone. i still use mutt (and slrn and
emacs) and do most of my file managing in bash, but always in X.
i also have zenwalk on a spare laptop i rarely use. zenwalk is fine,
because it's close enough to slackware not to get in my way. but there's no
compelling reason to switch.
--
Joost Kremers joostk...@yahoo.com
Selbst in die Unterwelt dringt durch Spalten Licht
EN:SiS(9)
Grant
>Hallo, Grant,
>
>Du meintest am 04.07.08:
>
>> When did you start using linux?
>
>Fall 1995, with XLinux (UMSdos, looked like slackware/zipslack)
>
>> How did you get hold of your first distro?
>
>CD from a computer magazine
>
>> Were you a refugee from another distro?
>
>I had tried many other distributions (most of them diskette versions):
>no one did run.
>System: Laptop Olivetti Philos 33 (?); 386SX, 16 MHz (?), 4 MB RAM.
I didn't mention hardware :) Back then I had a '386DX + '387 system with
all of 8MB RAM.
Grant.
--
http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/
Grant
>Grant wrote:
>> When did you start using linux?
>
>1999.
>
>> How did you get hold of your first distro?
>
>i bought a book about redhat (don't remember which version) that came with
>a cd. i stayed with redhat for about a day, then i went and bought the suse
>boxed set. 6.1 i think.
>
>> Were you a refugee from another distro?
>
>well, if you're talking about the first distro, that seems quite unlikely,
>right? ;-)
I'm sorry, what I meant to ask was did you come to slackware as a refugee
from another distro, like I did from redhat-6.2 after refusing to update to
7.x or 8.x and rejecting rh9 after a short trial ;)
...
>i also have zenwalk on a spare laptop i rarely use. zenwalk is fine,
>because it's close enough to slackware not to get in my way. but there's no
>compelling reason to switch.
That's one I've not tried, it's based on slackware?
Grant.
--
http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/
Eef Hartman
> When did you start using linux?
1994 (Slackware 1.1.2 or something like it) on a 486dx2/66
(8 MB RAM, 540 MB disk and ATI Mach32 display adaptor).
I still got that PC, by the way, but now it's got a whopping
16 MB of RAM and is running Slackware 4.0 <grin>
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
Downloaded from the Internet en put onto a set of floppies.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
Yes and no.
NOT from a Linux distribution, but we were working at the time on
HP workstations (9000/700), using HP-UX (a System-V Unix).
And we wanted to use the PC's too in a comparable environment.
As PC's got faster they gradually took over from the (much more
expensive) HP's.
--
*******************************************************************
** Eef Hartman, Delft University of Technology, dept. SSC/ICT **
** e-mail: E.J.M....@tudelft.nl, fax: +31-15-278 7295 **
** snail-mail: P.O. Box 5031, 2600 GA Delft, The Netherlands **
*******************************************************************
Glyn Millington
> When did you start using linux?
1997 I think.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
Redhat 5.2 cd with the book I was learning from.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
Abandoned RH, tried Mandrake and then Debian for a couple of years, hit
Slackware at 8 - I think. Currently have a mixture of Slackware 12.1 and
FreeBSD machines.
atb
Glyn
--
RTFM http://www.tldp.org/index.html
GAFC http://slackbook.org/ The Official Source :-)
STFW http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&group=alt.os.linux.slackware
JFGI http://jfgi.us/
Sylvain Robitaille
> When did you start using linux?
1995/1996
I think it was late 1995, and by mid 1996 I was using Linux exclusively
at home. By mid 1997 I started a (then new) job working with Unix
systems exclusively, and my workstation was running NetBSD.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
I purchased a boxed set that included the InfoMagic CD set with Matt
Welsh's Running Linux book.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
I started with Slackware because I had friends who were already using it
and I knew I could turn to them for help if I blew anything up, (which I
did, of course).
I was on a 33MHz 486DX system with (probably) 8MB RAM, maybe 4MB, (but
that ultimately got increased to 32MB at some point during the system's
lifetime), with 2 120MB hard drives. That was when I learned I needed
to choose between being able to compile a customized kernel or have
Emacs on my system. I have to admit I don't miss Emacs.
That system still exists in some mutation (with a replacement hard disk)
as my Internet gateway system at home. I've long been meaning to replace
it with a newer system I setup for that task, but haven't actually taken
the time to complete the swap.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Sylvain Robitaille s...@alcor.concordia.ca
Network and Systems analyst Concordia University
Instructional & Information Technology Montreal, Quebec, Canada
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Joost Kremers
> I have to admit I don't miss Emacs.
trust me, you do. you just don't know it.
joost (emacs evangelist)
Joost Kremers
> I'm sorry, what I meant to ask was did you come to slackware as a refugee
> from another distro,
yeah, i suspected as much. ;-)
[zenwalk]
> That's one I've not tried, it's based on slackware?
yeah, and it essentially just adds a few config utilities such as a panel
to configure things like network, keyboard, and such, and a graphical
package manager, which does dependency checking, but otherwise works with
the normal slackware package format. IIUC it also follows slackware
releases, so it's not developing further and further away from slack.
OTOH it has a strict philosophy of providing one tool for each job, at
least by default. so the standard graphical environment is Xfce, there's no
emacs, no mutt, that sort of thing. (though other apps can often be
installed through netpkg, and you won't destroy your install if you compile
from source.)
ray
Late 90's. Our DEC Alphas (with Tru64 Unix) were beginning to show their
age and we needed to replace them. Went with dual Xeon 1.7ghz DELLs
shipped with RedHat 6.x. This was at a major DOD test range where we did
postflight data analysis. Later I decided to install at home and went with
Mandrake. Currently use Gentoo, Ubuntu and Elive (once in a while) and
Debian.
wrha...@comcast.net
> Hi there,
>
> Just scanned the first linux box CD set I bought, Infomagic April 1997...
>
> http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/image/infomagic-front.jpg
> http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/image/infomagic-back.jpg
>
> Wanted to try Slackware back then as it had later kernel, but the install
> required a heap of floppies, so I started with RedHat instead.
You could get Slack on CD-ROM way back when, but not
directly from Volkerding. If I recall correctly it was from
Walnut Creek. That's the reason I bought my first CD-ROM
reader. It was Slackware 1.something. A local BBS had a
very early Slackware for download, but I did not try that.
Bud
Martin Schmitz
> [zenwalk]
> follows slackware releases,
No, it doesn't. Try to set up encrypted partitions with zenwalk then
you'll find out that all the init files are not yet up to Slackware
12.0.
Martin
jjg
Infomagic, January 1994, was the first occasion to know Linux. Well, it took
some time... it was not yet really perfect... I had a machine with 2M RAM
(!), and it was terribly slow... Actually, I have been interested in Unix
from the beginning of my career (around the '70s), so, although the initial
findings were not completely positive, I never lost interest.
I chose Slackware by that time because the name suggested something I liked,
and later on, I have not seen any reason to change that preference.
Nevertheless, by that time Microsoft was not only strong, but also quite
credible (they are still strong, but they have gradually lost their
credibility). So I ran both tracks (well, as a professional you cannot
really afford to know nothing about Microsoft) for several years.
Only in 1997, I decided I would dedicate a new machine primarily to Linux
(with Windows 95 as a second choice boot). And of course Slackware still
was my choice. I mean, I liked it anyway... it gave me a clear sight on
what was going on... it did not hide things (something which I began to
dislike in Windows), it just told you what it was doing, and not in a
form "translated for laymen", but just straight away.
I kept running Windows and Slackware side by side until 2003, but I still
did most of the "real" work on W98. Then I bought a new machine (well, I am
quite conservative in replacing hardware, but then, I still have a 486
running W95 and an XT running DOS) and I decided that Slackware (with KDE)
would be my primary choice. And that is still the case.
Currently I run Slack 12.1 on my main computer. I am also running, on
a "spare" computer, Ubuntu 8 (which I like, although I have seen a sig
saying that it means "Slackware is too difficult for me", well, never
mind...). What I like about Debian (which is also behind Ubuntu) is its
excellent distribution mechanism. Perhaps, if I had started Debian, I might
have staid there. But I see no other alternatives, really. I have worked
with SuSe, Red Hat, and occasionally a few other ones, and I find them a
bit too "user friendly", in the Microsoft sense: "this is what I think you
should mean...".
But, just to prevent distribution wars, I am quite aware that all current
distributions have made great progress in their user friendliness. However,
for me, the simplicity of Slackware stands unchallenged. If there were a
way to combine it with the huge repositories of Debian... well, I am
looking at slapt-get.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
No, except from Windows, but I guess that doesn't count.
Marty Felker
Red Hat Linux 6.0
Steven Winikoff
Joost Kremers <joostk...@yahoo.com> writes:
>Sylvain Robitaille wrote:
>> I have to admit I don't miss Emacs.
>trust me, you do. you just don't know it.
One of my favourite signature quotes, from
Jamie Riden <jamie...@gmail.com>:
"That was resolved ages ago. Emacs now has a vi mode proving finally
that vi is the better editor, and emacs is the better operating
system."
- Steven
________________________________________________________________________
Steven Winikoff |
Concordia University | "If at first you don't succeed,
Montreal, QC, Canada | transform your data set."
s...@alcor.concordia.ca |
http://alcor.concordia.ca/~smw | - fortune(6)
»Q«
> When did you start using linux?
2001, I think. I'm a newbie. :)
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
Downloaded a Gentoo ISO.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
I'm still with Gentoo. I use Slackware on a desktop that only has
dial-up; I wanted a networkless install, and networkless Gentoo
installs aren't any fun.
~kurt
I think it was '98 when I finally bought a computer with a CDROM.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
I had started using Unix systems full time at work and wanted to learn more
about them, so I picked up a book on Linux with RH 4.2. That CD was messed up,
so I just bought RH 5.0 at a local store.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
By the time I was using RH 6.0, I was generally avoiding the built in
GUI tools provided by the distro for system admin, and I was getting really
pissed off with rpm dependency hell issues. I ran across Slackware, read the
distro's philosophy, and started with SW 7.0. I occasionally play around with
another distro, but none work as well for me as SW.
- Kurt
MikeinAK
> When did you start using linux?
Slackware 7
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
Walnut creek cdrom
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
Windows 95 :D
MikeinAK
Grant
>Sylvain Robitaille wrote:
>> I have to admit I don't miss Emacs.
>
>trust me, you do. you just don't know it.
>
>joost (emacs evangelist)
Vim! :)
Grant.
--
http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/
Grant
...
>Currently I run Slack 12.1 on my main computer. I am also running, on
>a "spare" computer, Ubuntu 8 (which I like, although I have seen a sig
>saying that it means "Slackware is too difficult for me", well, never
>mind...). What I like about Debian (which is also behind Ubuntu) is its
>excellent distribution mechanism. Perhaps, if I had started Debian, I might
>have staid there. But I see no other alternatives, really. I have worked
>with SuSe, Red Hat, and occasionally a few other ones, and I find them a
>bit too "user friendly", in the Microsoft sense: "this is what I think you
>should mean...".
Yeah, recently I tried to install opensuse-11.0 64bit on Core2Duo box,
graphical installer didn't see the mouse, end of story. Slamd64 went
on just fine, but I have to update from -current to -12.1 which is out now.
>But, just to prevent distribution wars, I am quite aware that all current
>distributions have made great progress in their user friendliness. However,
>for me, the simplicity of Slackware stands unchallenged. If there were a
>way to combine it with the huge repositories of Debian... well, I am
>looking at slapt-get.
Debian and I never got on, and Ubuntu is a bit of a joke to me as it doesn't
come with compiler kit -- okay some searching brings to me the incantations
to install gcc & friends -- but it seemed too difficult compared to slackware.
On the other hand, a while back when awk crashed on certain input, I found
the source patch somewhere in Debian land. It is a tremendous resource.
Grant.
--
http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/
Grant
...
>I'm still with Gentoo. I use Slackware on a desktop that only has
>dial-up; I wanted a networkless install, and networkless Gentoo
>installs aren't any fun.
I didn't think _any_ Gentoo installs were fun... Maybe I tried it at the
wrong time but the thing updated itself, ate my configuration files and
killed itself :( Never been back.
Grant.
--
http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/
Grant
>Grant <g_r_a...@dodo.com.au> wrote:
>>
>> When did you start using linux?
>
>I think it was '98 when I finally bought a computer with a CDROM.
>
>> How did you get hold of your first distro?
>
>I had started using Unix systems full time at work and wanted to learn more
>about them, so I picked up a book on Linux with RH 4.2. That CD was messed up,
>so I just bought RH 5.0 at a local store.
Stirs a memory -- think I bought rh5.1 just before 5.2 was released :( But
my luck was good back then, subscribed to 'Byte on CD-ROM' just before they
ceased publishing the thing, got 8 years of Byte on disk -- requires win 3.1 :)
>
>> Were you a refugee from another distro?
>
>By the time I was using RH 6.0, I was generally avoiding the built in
>GUI tools provided by the distro for system admin, and I was getting really
>pissed off with rpm dependency hell issues. I ran across Slackware, read the
>distro's philosophy, and started with SW 7.0. I occasionally play around with
>another distro, but none work as well for me as SW.
Yeah, agree.
It's funny how some make an issue of having a dependency checker in their
package manager -- I really don't miss it with slackware. The odd time I've
had a missing whatsit*.so it's been easy enough to search the manifest and
install the required package. Doesn't happen often enough to be a problem,
specially now with cheap disk space, it's easy to do a full install.
I kept rh6.2 going long after it's use by date because it worked, and friends
going with later redhat's were having too many problems.
Grant.
--
http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/
notbob
> When did you start using linux?
RH 5.0 - jes playing with it
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
Bought 7-8 distros for $10 from one of the early burners: RH, Debian, BSD,
Corel, etc. I think even an early Slack, the only one I didn't try (hangs
head in shame) cuz I heard the install was too hard. Later discovered it
wasn't.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
Yes, stuck with RH with forays into Mandrake. Finally got disgusted by RH
7.2, it overwriting my changes, and other RH shenanigans. By this time, I'd
taken a Unix class and heard Slack was the most unix-like while still
retaining the advantages of linux (bash, etc). Jumped to Slack 8.0 and
haven't looked back. ;)
nb
Grant
Me sorta too, disgusted with rh9, I surveyed distros and chose slackware
around 2004 (slack 9.0) nothing else worth staying with :)
Grant.
--
http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/
Gordie
Bought a "Learn linux in 24 Hours" book with a RedHat 5.0 CD inside.
Downoaded RH 5.1
My next distro was Slackware 9.0 and am still with Slackware today. Used
10, missed 11, used 12.0 and 12.1 and now Current.
LOL didn't learn Linux in 24 Hours. Still learning and wouldn't have it
any other way.
Grant
...
>Bought a "Learn linux in 24 Hours" book with a RedHat 5.0 CD inside.
>Downoaded RH 5.1
>My next distro was Slackware 9.0 and am still with Slackware today. Used
>10, missed 11, used 12.0 and 12.1 and now Current.
>
>LOL didn't learn Linux in 24 Hours. Still learning and wouldn't have it
>any other way.
Yay! What keeps me here on slackware :) It's fun! Plus on the server box
'it just works'...
Grant.
--
http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/
Sylvain Robitaille
> ... I occasionally play around with another distro, but none work as
> well for me as SW.
s/for me //
I would argue, though I'm impressed at how well some of the Debian
derivative distributions do function (specifically the Xandros-based
installation on the Asus EeePC, and to some extent Ubuntu, though I
don't have very extensive experience with that one ...) They're
different, and they're intended for users with different expectations
than Slackware is, and given those expectations they work quite well,
and in the end, the end-user wins by being able to choose that which
best meets his/her expectations and/or requirements. Slackware. ;-)
Kees Theunissen
> When did you start using linux?
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
For an other 116 reactions, including mine, to basically the
same questions see:
(URL might have been wrapped)
Regards,
Kees.
--
Kees Theunissen.
HJohnson
> Hi there,
>
- - - < snip > - - - -
> When did you start using linux?
Around 1992/93....
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
On a CDRom that I bought from Canada and mailed to here (California). The
outfit was called JANA. (If you know who they are, you are older than
dirt!). Then got a copy of SLS, finally a copy of Slackware (around '94
or '95, I think.)
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
Nope, Linux was in its infancy, then. I mean real infancy.
>
> Cheers,
> Grant.
--
humjohn AT verizon DOT net
(Who is older than the Greek Titans)
Leon Whyte
> Hi there,
>
> Just scanned the first linux box CD set I bought, Infomagic April 1997...
>
> http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/image/infomagic-front.jpg
> http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/image/infomagic-back.jpg
>
> Wanted to try Slackware back then as it had later kernel, but the install
> required a heap of floppies, so I started with RedHat instead. Stayed with
> RedHat through version 6.2 which I kept for a while, ignoring 7, 8, and
> disappointed with RH9 I surveyed available distros and switched to Slackware
> at version 9.0 in 2004. Still with Slackware-11.0 on older hardware and
> Slackware-12.1 on a newer box.
>
>
> Grant.
My first Linux was a came from a ham friend in Norway. I think it might have
been one of the original slacks but not sure. It came on 32 1.2 floppies and I
ran it on a 386DX with 8 megs ram. No xwindows just cli but it was very
interesting. Next I bought was RedHat 4.
I was not able to get onto the net with it. Very cumbersome and not at all
intuitive.
Next I got Caldera 1.2 and which I was able to run on the net and went with all
up to Caldera 3.0 till I found they were being really stupid and trying to sue
everybody.
I went to Slackware 2.2 the package I still have in it's box. I have run every
Slackware since. I am running Slackware 12 and have 12.1 but find too many
things that don't quite work for me but I keep mucking with it to make it work
for me.
--
Leon
A computer without Microsoft is like a chocolate cake without mustard.
< running Linux >
~kurt
> don't have very extensive experience with that one ...) They're
> different, and they're intended for users with different expectations
> than Slackware is, and given those expectations they work quite well,
> and in the end, the end-user wins by being able to choose that which
> best meets his/her expectations and/or requirements. Slackware. ;-)
That is what I hated about all these doom and gloom sayers in the late
90's talking about how Linux had to get its act together, and consolidate
into a single distro, or else it was sure to fail as an OS.... If anything
the variety is a strength of the OS.
- Kurt
»Q«
Gentoo users do have to be vigilant about correctly updating the config
files after updating software. Occasionally, I get some breakage, but
googling or the ml sorts me out pretty quickly.
Lubiraz Alerano
>
> > Were you a refugee from another distro?
>
> Windows 95 :D
>
> MikeinAK
The same here, 13 diskettes of Win95, kicked me for change. As DOS+WFW
long time learner, user, sufferer Slackware was the easy choice.
So it is still the distro on screen in version 12.1 now.
"Those were the times, my friend...!"
Have fun
Stanislaw
Slack user from Ulladulla
Michael C.
> When did you start using linux?
Prbably late 98, early 99.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
Caldera OpenLinux 1.3, came on a CD with a book, iirc Getting Started
With Linux.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
I spent little time with COL, but picked up the RH7.2 box set, from
there I went to Mandrake, Debian, Knoppix and Ubuntu as primary
systems.
If I come across something that I need to compile from source and
can't find the correct development packages, I'll dual boot into the
latest slackware and work from there because I know I can use that to
help troubleshoot the problem without distro patches getting in the
way.
Unfortunately, I've gotten lazy using Debian and Ubuntu and gotten too
used to their package management.
Michael C.
--
mjcha...@verizon.net http://mcsuper5.freeshell.org/
Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.
Ron Gibson
> When did you start using linux?
Forgot exactly, but around @1993-4, When Slackware was using kernel
version .9, IIRC.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
Downloaded via FTP through university account.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
Nope. There was only Slack, Dead Rat and Yggardisil (sp???) available
anyway to me.
My dislike of RPM spans decades.
--
Email - rsgi...@verizon.borg
Replace borg with net
"Ubuntu" - an African word, meaning "Slackware is too hard for me".
Xatapu
> > When did you start using linux?
2005/2006.
> > How did you get hold of your first distro?
I made an ISO of NetBSD and installed it on a Gateway P5-100 Pentium
I.
X windows blew up on that machine. Later I tried Ubuntu on a Pentium
III, but it was too slow and Windows-like, and my dad needed the
machine.
> > Were you a refugee from another distro?
Yep. Windoze XP, Ubuntu 7.04. Now I use Slackware 12.1 on a home-built
Intel Core 2 Duo (E4500) PC. It runs so fast - I love it!
Jon Moller
MatthewK
1996 or 1997 I was ticked off/poor that windows 95 had no more
dos. My parents gave me their old 486 and things started from
there.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
I started with 1 disc version and then got a cheap sampler
pack. Slackware was the only distro I could figure out how to
install. I think it was 2.X, then after months of messing with
FTP and dialup I bought the 3.5 cd set.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
I pretty much just came from windows 3.11. I've played with
debian in recent times and have a liking for grml linux, but
slackware is my mainstay.
matthew
+Alan Hicks+
Hash: SHA1
On 2008-07-04, Joost Kremers <joostk...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> I have to admit I don't miss Emacs.
>
> trust me, you do. you just don't know it.
Can't miss where you haven't been.
-- Malcolm Reynolds
- --
It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise,
Than for a man to hear the song of fools.
Ecclesiastes 7:5
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Mark P. Nelson
news:282s649a1f2vhb0jk...@4ax.com:
> Hi there,
>
> Just scanned the first linux box CD set I bought, Infomagic April
> 1997...
>
> http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/image/infomagic-front.jpg
> http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/image/infomagic-back.jpg
>
> Wanted to try Slackware back then as it had later kernel, but the
> install required a heap of floppies, so I started with RedHat instead.
> Stayed with RedHat through version 6.2 which I kept for a while,
> ignoring 7, 8, and disappointed with RH9 I surveyed available distros
> and switched to Slackware at version 9.0 in 2004. Still with
> Slackware-11.0 on older hardware and Slackware-12.1 on a newer box.
>
> When did you start using linux?
1993
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
A grad student from the University of Helsinki gave me 30+ floppies. It
was the Soft Landing Systems distro. that was broken on install, with
kernel 0.99pl10. I managed to fix it up so it worked, which got me a job.
Spent the next 3 years patching the kernel every week or so and ftping
the latest bits and pieces from Helsinki every so often.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
I had been using Mark Williams' Coherent at home for a couple of years.
I found Slackware three years later--the first disk set I can find is
Slackware 96. Tried RedHat once, the Mother's Day edition--thought it was
very annoying and broken in so many places, so reformatted that machine
right away.
Mark.
--
While I'll admit that anyone can make a mistake once, to go on making
the same lethal errors century after century seems to me nothing short
of deliberate.--V.
Stephen Bloom
> Hi there,
> When did you start using linux?
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
Feb 1997. I downloaded Slack 3.1(?)-current at work,
which had ethernet connections to the internet, onto
a Jaz drive. There was a long and leisurely learning
curve as I gradually came to grips with the install, X,
and getting access to the net (I declared "victory" in
this effort sometime in November 1997).
I took a detour through SUSE-land (2.2.13 kernel) for
a couple of years, but returned to Slack in 8/2001
with v.8.0., and have remained with Slack ever since.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
Well, I had been using various flavors of UNIX at
work since 1991 (Sun workstations, then SGI). Before
that, we had "dumb" terminals networked to a mainframe.
We finally switched over to Linux boxes where I work
in 2004. Naturally, I managed to keep Slack on
*my* box (took some doing..); everyone else is using
some flavor of Red Hat Enterprise.
I currently run 12.1 on my work machine (Dell Precision
360), my new(ish) laptop (Dell Latitude D820), and
a new quad-core intel desktop at home.
Steve
Realto Margarino
>> When did you start using linux?
>> How did you get hold of your first distro?
>Feb 1997. I downloaded Slack 3.1(?)-current at work,
>which had ethernet connections to the internet, onto
>a Jaz drive. There was a long and leisurely learning
>curve as I gradually came to grips with the install, X,
>and getting access to the net (I declared "victory" in
>this effort sometime in November 1997).
We started out in 94 or 95 and it was either SLS or slackware...7 or
8 diskettes downloaded over a 2400 baud modem through a Ultrix sparc
server to an os/2 PC.
Before that we gave coherent a try but it didn't have any tcp/ip or
even uucp, if we recall correctly. It ran on a 286, if you can
believe that.
cordially, as always,
rm
bgeer
>Grant <g_r_a...@dodo.com.au> wrote:
>> Hi there,
>> When did you start using linux?
>> How did you get hold of your first distro?
1993, a Transameritech CD of Slackware 1.0 (I think...or maybe that was
the version of the kernel that was on it).
Ran it first on a 8Mb ram 486.
--
<> Robert Geer & Donna Tomky | |||| We sure |||| <>
<> bg...@xmission.com | == == find it == == <>
<> dto...@xmission.com | == == enchanting == == <>
<> Albuquerque, NM USA | |||| here! |||| <>
Julio Uehara
> When did you start using linux?
Probably around 1994.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
Downloading from the University of Manchester, the Linux interim
distribution. Got my first taste of a UNIX-like OS by installing
about 10 floppies.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
Later, got an Yggdrasil Linux (kernel 1.1) from Walnut Creek CDROM.
As Yggdrasil was discontinued, bought a Linux: Getting Started book,
by Matt Welsh, that included a Slackware CDROM (can't find it now).
-- Julio
Giovanni
> When did you start using linux?
June of 1996.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
The Infomagic CD set of April '96 bought at a computer store.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
No. I always used Slackware.
Ciao
Giovanni
--
A computer is like an air conditioner,
it stops working when you open Windows.
Registered Linux user #337974 < http://giovanni.homelinux.net/ >
andrew
> When did you start using linux?
Perhaps in contrast to many on this thread I only started with linux 2
years or so ago.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
Believe it or not it came pre-installed on an ebay computer: a little HP
e-PC that came with Ubuntu Hoary Hedgehog :-). At this time this version
was more than a little dated and the computer itself blew up fairly soon
after.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
Although I use Slackware 12.0 on my desktop computer I came from a
substantial Ubuntu background: Dapper Drake, Edgy Eft, Feisty Faun,
Hardy Heron and now the alpha of Intrepid Ibex. When I moved to
Slackware I simply installed Ubuntu on my laptop where it works
beautifully. So rather than being a refugee coming to Slackware I quite
happily use 2 _very_ different distros.
Andrew
Theodore Heise
> Just scanned the first linux box CD set I bought, Infomagic April 1997...
> When did you start using linux?
In 2001 ('tho I had some UNIX experience 10 years before).
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
On CD with the book "Red Hat Linux: The Complete Reference" (v7.2).
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
I came to Slackware in 2003, after getting fed up with dependency
and RPM issues when adding/upgrading packages. I've been very
happy with Slackware--started with 9.1, and now run 10.2.
--
Theodore (Ted) Heise <th...@heise.nu> Bloomington, IN, USA
Bud
nrver figure out as I finally got it to load using loadlin to an MO
drive where I got a kernel panic.
Bought Corel ver ? but I never could get it online, my stupidity. I
read Linux news groups and finally figured it out but by that time I
was using 5.1 RHat which didn't have my video card listed. Then I
bought a bunch of CDs and tried many and ended up using Slackware 7.1
which was my choice for a long time. That one I figured out how to use
my Wacom tablet.
Then Mandrake and now back to Slack. I got tired of the blue screen on
Win 98 and don't even have a M$ OS on my desktop mix and match pieces
I put together, this is the third one I think.
I'm just an operator now, I can't concentrate long enough to be of
much help if anyone needs it. Toooo, many pills keep me groggy and if
I stop taking them I am SOL on concentrating.
--
Bud
Martin Boening
On 2008-07-04, Grant <g_r_a...@dodo.com.au> wrote:
>
> When did you start using linux?
sometime in late 1992. Used SLS 0.98, IIRC.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
FTP downlowd using an ftp to mail gateway...
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
No. SLS was one of the first distributions if not THE first distribution
there was. I switched to Slackware after it was discontinued and stayed
with it ever since...
Have fun,
Martin
--
Martin Boening, mb...@t-online.de, Linux Registered User #258205
KERNEL: A part of an operating system that preserves the medieval
traditions of sorcery and black art.
Daniel de Kok
> Just scanned the first linux box CD set I bought, Infomagic April
> 1997...
>
> http://bugsplatter.mine.nu/image/infomagic-back.jpg
I loved the Infomagic sets :).
> When did you start using linux?
1994, with Slackware Linux. It must have been ~1.1.2, because I remember
when 2.0 was released, and I was already tinkering with Slackware. I did
have a copy of Slackware in 1993, but our machine only had 2 MB RAM, and
I did not look much further. I traded that 1993 magazine Slackware CD
with a Sherlock Holmes CD-ROM game ;).
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
On a CD-ROM included with a (IIRC Dutch) magazine.
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
No, I used DOS and OS/2 before starting with Slackware.
-- Daniel
Blikje Ham
I started using Linux in 1997 or 1998. It was Red Hat 5.2. I've tried Red Hat
6.0 and 6.2, and then switched to Slackware 7.1.
> How did you get hold of your first distro?
My uncle brought along a book: Linux in 24 hours, or something in that line. It
had the Red Hat 5.2 CD with it. Later on, that same uncle came with Slackware
7.1
> Were you a refugee from another distro?
In a certain way, I was. I came from Red Hat to Slackware, because I thought
that 7.1 was way newer than 6.2. Remember that I was young, back then.
Since the switch to Slackware, I've been a happy slacker since. But after
buying my 64bit machine I started trying Gentoo. I stayed with that for my
Desktop, but
all my laptops run Slackware.